


Until Human Voices Wake Us

by lesbianophelia



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Adoption, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Baby Primrose, F/F, Families of Choice, Found Family, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, No Lesbians Die, Queer Families, Secret Relationship, Teen Pregnancy, Victor Katniss
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-10
Updated: 2019-10-08
Packaged: 2020-02-29 09:30:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18775525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbianophelia/pseuds/lesbianophelia
Summary: Then there are the things Katniss left for her. A jacket that once belonged to her father, a book that belonged to her mother. She asked me to give them to Primrose if she didn’t make it back. Wanted her to have something to remember her by. And there was a weird break there, where she said, “She should have something to remember her . . .” and then her voice broke off, like she didn’t know what to call herself.“Her mom,” I said before I decided to. “She should have something to remember her mom by.”Katniss’s eyes got all big, and then the Peacekeepers knocked at the door, and she said,“Patricia,” with her voice all choked off like I had never heard it before. Like I never heard it since.“You’ll come home,” I said, and the urgency even surprised me. “You’ll come home, and she’ll have both of us. More moms than she’ll know what to do with.”(District Twelve AU. Femme!Peeta. Victor!Katniss. Toddler!Prim.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Victor's Wife](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2209791) by [lesbianophelia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbianophelia/pseuds/lesbianophelia). 



It isn’t Effie Trinket who has the unfortunate task of visiting the Community Home in preparation for today’s celebration. I’ve never seen this particular escort before, but it’s clear that however much they’re getting paid to be in District Twelve doesn’t seem like  _ quite  _ enough to them. That much is obvious in the way that their lilac painted lips keep tugging down as they glance around the room. I can’t tell if the look they’re going for, with the white suspenders over the deep violet of their shirt, is meant to be somewhere between Effie Trinket and Caesar Flickerman, or if their tastes are just unfortunate enough to make them look like the child of the two. Their hair is shaved straight down to the scalp, but there’s some chevron pattern of lilac, light blue, and pink happening there that’s frankly a little hard to look at. 

 

It’s awful, but I take some sort of pleasure in knowing what a shock it must be to them, with their hairstyle that would have cost enough to rent a full house for me and my daughter for several months, seeing where Katniss Everdeen lives.  _ Lived _ , I correct myself silently. She’s going to live in the Victor’s Village now, and though I’ve had plenty of time to adjust myself to the the idea of it being just me and Primrose, who is curled up against my chest, I still keep forgetting about it. 

 

There’s no questioning why they’re here. To get Katniss’s things and bring them to her new house. They’re all gathered up already, though I had planned on giving them to her myself. And though it’s selfish, though I’m not sure I’ll even have a chance to see her until tomorrow. I’m in no hurry to give them up to this Capitolite. So I don’t offer them any help at all, don’t even look up from the sock I’m knitting. 

 

It’ll just be us, soon. Me, Primrose, who is asleep against my chest, fast asleep, and the ten other girls who share the room with us. The Capitolite stays fixed in the doorway, looking something like aghast. Maybe at the pot set up just beside the cot I share with my daughter. There to collect the water from the leak in the roof. It hasn’t rained in the last few days, but it isn’t worth it to move the pot other than to empty it out. 

 

“Primrose,” the escort says, clearly reading off of the clipboard. And I hate it. Her name in that accent. The same accent, if not the same voice, that took Katniss away just a few weeks earlier. My grip on the baby in my lap tightens, just enough to wake her. I whisper a little  _ shh, baby _ , and she blinks up at me, clearly groggy, but here. She won’t be old enough for the Reaping for another eleven years. Not that I’m not already terrified. 

 

I try to remind myself of the thing that hasn’t seemed quite real in the days since Katniss’s victory in the arena. That she’s safe, now. Or will be, soon. Safe, and  _ here _ . In District Twelve, at least, if not with me. 

 

“Primrose Mellark and Patricia Mellark,” they read, and finally, I lift my head. The escort’s smile looks very nearly sarcastic, and my stomach twists painfully.   
  
And then, to my surprise, they clap as if they’re completely delighted. “Oh, _thank you_ , I’m so glad not to have to go into any more of these rooms.”   
  
I swallow. They can make me come, of course. No one can stop them from doing anything they’d like to me, or to my daughter. Still, my legs are like lead as I consider what’s the worst that might come from me refusing to move. 

 

“Well, now, come come,” they say, looking at me as if they think I’m very slow. “You shouldn’t need long to pack your things, should you?”   
  
“My things?” I ask, throat dry as I speak, finally. “For what?”   
  
They manage to roll their entire head along with their eyes. “Oh, for _Capitol_ ’s sake -- did no one tell you?” 

 

They mutter something to themselves as they stalk towards the bed, and I adjust my grasp on Primrose just a little, trying to appear casual as I shift us towards the other side of the cot. 

 

“I don’t know why they left it all to  _ me _ when there’s only so much  _ I  _ can do by myself.” They take a moment, clearly attempting to reign in what might become hysteria if they don’t manage to calm themselves, and then say, “Well then -- you’re expected as a guest at tonight’s banquet. We haven’t much time and my job is -- or I’m expected to, rather -- to make you look  _ presentable _ and it isn’t doing either of us any good to stay here talking about it, is it?”    
  


I draw in a shaky breath and stand. My things are already packed, of course. I think they’ve all been in the same cellophane bag since the day I showed up here. We have to be ready to leave every night, should we break conduct or age out or forget to check in by 5pm. They would just hold my things at the front desk until I came to pick them up. 

 

I start by looking over Primrose’s things, which hardly need a bag of their own. Other than the patched dress she wears today -- a gift from Katniss, just before the Reaping -- there are a few Community Home garments that she, of course, isn’t permitted to keep. A couple of pairs of socks I knit from a sweater Katniss unraveled, and a few extra cloth diapers that I managed to get by trading in the boots I was wearing when I got kicked out. Katniss was furious with me when she realized what I had done, but I was pregnant and hormonal and as soon as I started scrubbing at the skin under my eye with the back of my hand she let up on me. 

 

Then there are the things Katniss left for her. A jacket that once belonged to her father, a book that belonged to her mother. She asked me to give them to Primrose if she didn’t make it back. Wanted her to have something to remember her by. And there was a weird break there, where she said,  _ “She should have something to remember her . . .”  _ and then her voice broke off, like she didn’t know what to call herself. 

 

_ “Her  _ mom _ ,” _ I said before I decided to.  _ “She should have something to remember her mom by.” _

 

Katniss’s eyes got all big, and then the Peacekeepers knocked at the door, and she said, 

 

_ “Patricia,”  _ with her voice all choked off like I had never heard it before. Like I never heard it since. 

 

 _“You’ll come home,”_ I said, and the urgency even surprised me. _“You’ll come home, and she’ll have both of us. More moms than she’ll know what to do with.”_ __  
__  
She didn’t answer. Didn’t have a chance to, before the Peacekeeper grabbed me by the arm, and Katniss was shouting for him to let go of me, and then -- then I’m not entirely certain what happened. Just that she managed to pass the baby back to me, and then the door slammed between us, and I rested my forehead against the dark wooden door, knowing that she would never hear me even if I did have the guts to tell her that I loved her. __  
__  
  


“Can we  _ please _ get out of here?” the escort asks. “I have a car waiting for us outside and sweetheart, judging by the looks of you, we really ought to get started.” 

 

I’ve never been in a car before. They took Katniss away in this same one after the Reaping, when she had to go from the Justice Building to the Train Station. I hold Primrose tightly in my lap as the car bumps along. Not to the station, this time, but to the Victor’s Village. 

 

“Is she--?” I breathe, my heart kicking up in my chest, and the escort rolls their eyes again. 

 

“Hasn’t anyone in this district ever watched a homecoming before? No, the whole District will be there when her train comes in. But we have to get you two presentable  _ somewhere, _ don’t we?” 

 

It feels strange -- bad, to be in Katniss’s house before she’s even been inside of it. We’ve all seen the massive buildings in the Victor’s Village, but no one I’ve ever known has been inside of one before. The ceilings are high, walls and moulding a stark white and the hardwood floors stained a deep, rich brown. There isn’t much furniture, either. A bright white couch that faces a stone fireplace, separated by a few yards and a low coffee table with a glass surface.   
  
I’m ushered past the dining room, which could comfortably seat six people at least, and hardly even have the chance to glance at the kitchen before they’re pushing us up the stairs. I’m ushered into a bathroom with a door on the other side that leads into what must be a bedroom. They’ve clearly set up camp in it. The escort turns the shower on and tells me to be quick, and not to bother putting my dress back on after. 

 

I’ve showered before. At the community home, we have a single cold water spout that we have to be out from in just a few minutes. This shower is completely different, and though the baby clings against me when we step in, she realizes quickly that the water isn’t freezing and looks up at me in wonder. We had a tub, at the bakery. And though the water was always less than warm when I got in, it was better than anything Primrose has known before just now. 

 

I kiss the top of her head, wondering when, exactly, will be a good time to apologize to her for the cards she was dealt. 

 

. . . 

  
  


It takes hours for the prep team to get me to what they call Beauty Base Zero. It’s a process that entails ridding me of all hair that doesn’t grow on my head and face, a process during which I keep my eyes trained on Primrose enviously, since I know they won’t pull any of this nonsense on her with me around. 

 

Once I’ve been properly plucked, waxed, shaved, and exfoliated, they focus in on the hair that  _ is  _ allowed to exist, on my head and my eyebrows. There’s even more plucking -- they promise me that it’s normal when my eyes start to water from the pain. 

 

Another one sculpts and paints my nails a pale pink, while the third works some lather into what’s left of my hair that’s meant to help with the way it naturally curls. They already pinned up half of the hair on the back of my neck and shaved the rest with a buzzing razor -- an  _ undercut _ , they called it. It’s all the rage in the Capitol, I guess. 

 

And then there’s the matter of getting me dressed. I try not to make clear my discomfort with the frilly undergarments they pass me, and though they laugh at my request for privacy now that they’ve seen everything there is to see, they oblige me. 

 

I lean against the door once they’ve filed into the hall, eyes closed tightly. I don’t know why I’m even  _ here _ . What Katniss will say when they present her to me like -- like I’m something she wants? I wonder if I’ll be able to explain to her that I didn’t ask for this. That this wasn’t my fault. 

 

After I watched them drive her off in the car, after our goodbyes in the Justice Building, I waited. I don’t know what I expected, exactly. Katniss Everdeen barely even offered information up to me when I asked for it, and it was no different when she was interviewed by Caesar Flickerman. 

 

She was gorgeous, and nothing like herself, giggling and gushing about her stylist and her dress, which, as has been the trademark in some form or another since District Twelve got a new stylist, burst into flames when she spun around, laughing and holding onto Caesar’s arm for support. 

 

While she caught her breath in her seat, he asked her if there was anyone waiting for her at home, and she laughed and deflected, and then her eyes lingered on her hands in her lap as she said that the reason she really wanted to go home was that she wanted to have her own house. Caesar is a master at this by now -- he’s been hosting interviews as long as I’ve been alive, and he runs with this for the rest of the interview, painting a picture that’s embellished but mostly accurate, of a girl who lives in the community home, who hasn’t had a home to go to for years. 

 

“Do you have anything to say to anyone at home?” he asked as the timer in the bottom of the screen ticked away, and then her eyes locked on the camera as she said, 

 

“No. I don’t.”   
  
And that was it. Or should have been, at least.

 

It’s not like I had the option not to watch the Games. And it’s not like I’ve ever been able to look away from Katniss Everdeen, who’s odds never put her in even the top four until there were only ten tributes left. By then, it was almost too late for anyone to pay any attention to her at all. It’s always been like that, I think. 

 

Primrose gets away easily. Just the shower earlier and a frilly, lacy dress that seems to keep her pretty well occupied where she sits on the bed across the room. I think the prep team must know that I’d never allow for something like this to happen to her, even if I’ve barely put up a fight while they poked and prodded over me. 

 

When they come back in, I have to try on not just one but four different dresses before they finally settle on one that’s a yellow so pale it’s nearly just white, with faded floral print on it. It ties behind my neck and laces up at my back, and though I don’t exactly have curves to show off, it does show enough of my chest to make me feel deeply self conscious. 

 

The one with the pink hair clasps a huge pearl necklace monstrosity onto me, as if we should draw  _ more  _ attention to my breasts, and then they put me in white heels that I think are probably specifically so I can’t run away. 

 

I think the cooing over how beautiful I finally am part is the worst. Until they start in on the makeup. I flinch every time they bring something close to my eyes, and though they seem to think it’s cute at first, it loses its novelty quickly. They use a white pencil to color in my bottom eyelid, which they say will make my eyes look bigger. And then there’s mascara, that makes my eyelashes almost preternaturally long. They line my upper eyelashes with something that’s a sky blue, and then they dust my whole face with pink blush. There are my lips, too, which are a red that’s dark and glossy and flat all at once.   
  
They braid back part of my hair like a crown along the left side of my head, and leave the rest, save for the shaved bit underneath, to curl and wave around my back and shoulders. Even with the few inches they chopped off of what they called dead hair, it looks long. 

 

I hardly even recognize myself in the mirror. Maybe Katniss won’t, either, and Prim and I can leave before I have to explain how I got dragged out here. 

 

Finally, they ask if I’m ready to go, and laugh when I ask if we’re headed to the train station. “The Victor has already arrived,” the one from earlier says, snake eyes flicking between me and my daughter, who they’ve changed again, into a dress that more closely resembles mine. “She’s getting ready at the Mayor’s mansion. You’ll see her soon.” 

 

. . . 

 

I haven’t been inside the Mayor’s mansion but once or twice. And certainly never in the dining room -- just the back stoop, or, if it was raining, the kitchen that the back door leads into, where I would wait for Madge to run upstairs and grab things from her bedroom so we could leave. 

 

There aren’t many merchants who make the cut for an event like this, of course. The Undersees are here because they have to be, living here and all, and then there are a few of the highest ranking Peacekeepers, as well as a couple of delegates from the Capitol. And me and my daughter, for whatever reason. I keep her at my side, even though she’s starting to get restless. The poor thing, of course she is. 

 

No one fills their seats in the dining room yet, they just mill about, drinking wine and chatting, and once I’ve found the place card with my name on it, I start to wander with Primrose. I don’t think she’s ever had to stay this still and quiet for so long. So I tell her we can walk around as long as she holds my hand. She isn’t very fast on her feet, anyway. Though she has made some improvements since that last night before the Reaping, when Katniss and I knelt on the floor beside our cot and whispered encouragement to the baby as she ambled back and forth between us on unsteady feet. 

 

That was more than a month ago. A  _ month _ since I’ve seen Katniss, who insists no one waits for her at home other than her new house. The bed she’s excited to have to herself. My stomach twists painfully. 

 

Prim ambles forward, and as we round a corner, I manage to scoop her up just before she collides with the back of someone just a little taller than me. He doesn’t notice -- he’s talking quietly to someone standing in front of him, but I use it as a teaching moment. 

 

“Whoops! See, we gotta be careful, baby,” I say, using the quiet voice I reserve for her. She babbles in response, and I kiss the tip of her nose, grateful when my lipstick doesn’t smear onto her precious little skin. “You wanna go sit down?”   
  
I get a _bah_ in response.   
  
“Me neither,” I admit, forgetting myself.

 

The man in front of us freezes, and then turns around very deliberately. And  _ oh _ . Oh, I’m so stupid. The Undersees are here, and by extension, so is the man marrying Madge in the spring. 

 

“Patricia,” he says tightly. And I find myself frozen by his eyes -- they’re blue like mine and Primrose’s, but cold as they flip between me and the baby. He’s doing the math, I can tell. Trying to figure out if I had gotten myself knocked up before or after Mom and Dad threw me out. “This is new,” he says, nodding at my daughter. 

 

“Not really,” I say. She had a birthday last week. Her first one. I tried to make it as happy as I could while I kept an eye on the screen at Katniss, who still hadn’t made any alliances since the one with the girl from Eleven. “I must have just forgotten to mail your invite to the baby shower.” 

  
Madge smiles tightly, her arm on Rye’s shoulder as she says, “She’s beautiful. What’s her name?”   
  
I’m frozen in place. I don’t want to tell her, don’t want them to know. I didn’t even want them to know she existed. We last saw each other when Madge admitted to him. Everything we did -- everything she asked me to do. To her, for her, with her. He came storming into the house, and though I was there when he screamed about me to our mother, I didn’t have anything to say. Not that I had the chance to speak.   
  
Undeterred by my lack of response, Madge coos a, “Hi, sweetheart,” and I take two steps back on instinct, hating the idea of her ever touching my daughter.   
  
“Fuck’s sake, Patricia,” Rye says, and Madge backhands his arm softly, clearly more for the language in front of the baby than for the message. “How did that even happen? With you -- you know.” 

  
Yeah. I do know.   
  
I don’t owe him the story. Even though he knows parts of it -- like how I had a boyfriend. Even back when Madge and I fooled around. And how I never let him touch me at all until that night. When I got thrown out of my house, and he held me while I cried. Tucked my hair behind my ear and told me that it wasn’t fair, that I was still so beautiful even then. Like that was what you should be thinking about when someone you love sobs in your arms.   
  
And then --   
  
Well.   
  


“If you can’t figure out how a baby gets made, I’m not sure you should be aiming for that spring wedding,” I shoot instead. 

 

His nostrils flare, and Madge says his name, all gentle, like she said mine once. She was my best friend. 

 

“Why are you here?” he asks.   
  
In truth, I don’t know. Not that I can tell him that.   
  
“They got you all dolled up. You really the best the community home has to offer?” he asks. “Figures. Everything else in there must be covered in coal dust. I’m surprised--” His eyes dip to Primrose, and before he can finish his thought, Madge says,   
  
“Ryan. Please, be civil.”   
  


“I’m being perfectly civil,” he defends, and I snort. “She just shouldn’t be here, is all.”   
  
He’s right, of course. 

 

I shouldn’t. 

 

“Patricia. He doesn’t mean--”   
  
“You’re a little late to try and play peacemaker, babe,” I say, and she flinches at the name she used to call me, when no one else could hear. Most surprising of all, being face to face with her again for the first time since Rye found out, is that I don’t miss her.   
  
Being with Whitley that night -- it wasn’t like it was with Madge. Worse, certainly, but different, too. Or maybe it’s just that I was different. More passive, save for a few forced hums of what was meant to sound like pleasure while he licked his way down my neck in a way that was maybe meant somewhere to be sexy but was mostly just . . . wet. 

 

But the whole thing -- the closeness I thought I might have been able to feel with Whitley during all of this. That I could get him to love me, or at least actually care for me, so that it didn’t matter when the news got to him inevitably. Or so that it would matter less, I guess. It didn’t last. The sex itself, maybe a full two minutes once he had given up on slobbering on my neck. And the closeness, too. It was a few hours later, barely even the next morning when my mother spoke to his, and I was thrown out all over again. 

 

By the time I missed my cycle, I had pushed the whole instance from my mind. But my body had other plans, obviously.

 

“Don’t call me that,” she hisses, afraid, now, that someone might be listening. Not Rye, but anyone at all. 

 

“How about I just don’t call you anything?” I ask.   
  
She’s going to protest, I think, but then her eyes catch on something over my shoulder, and I take the chance to leave while I still can. I hear them whispering behind me. An argument, maybe. But I have no interest in sticking around to hear what they have to say about me. 

 

The porch out front, much more spacious than the back stoop I used to come to meet Madge at, screened in and lit from the windows just inside. No one is in the front room, thankfully, and I’m grateful to be alone for the first time.   
  
There’s a big swing on the far side, which shifts as soon as we sit in it, and Primrose shrieks, delighted, and even as I tell her to use our inside voices, I can’t help my smile. “Maybe Katniss’ll get you a swing, for when we visit,” I say, though it’s dangerous to daydream at all, let alone out loud. 

 

“Kat _ -nah _ ,” she repeats, eyes bright as she tests out the name. I’ve never heard her say it before, and something in my chest clenches painfully. 

  
“Yes, Katniss,” I agree. “You remember Katniss.”   
  
“Kat- _nah_ , Kat- _nah_ ,” she prattles happily, clumsy little fingers clasping around the tacky necklace they put on me earlier. “Mama,” she says, though she’s distracted.   
  
“Baby,” I echo, looking right at her. But she doesn’t continue. “What, baby?”   
  
Then the _Katniss_ babble starts again. It figures. She would have heard the name a thousand times today alone, not to mention over the last few weeks. She slumps forward a little, hands still occupied with my necklace, and whines a little. 

 

“I know,” I whisper, kissing the top of her head. She smells so flowery, from the soap we used earlier. She’s so tired. I wish I could bring her somewhere better to rest -- it’s past her bedtime already, but I’m sure if we were allowed to leave, they would have told us. “Me too, baby.”  
  
I’m not sure how long we’re out there. Long enough for me to finish reciting the poem she likes -- the one my grandmother taught me before she died. It’s what I always do to calm her down. I can’t sing like Katniss, and I don’t even bother trying. It does its job, though, and convinces her to settle in against me. I know by the change in her breathing that she’s asleep before long. 

 

The door to the porch slams against the side of the house, and then closes much more gently. The baby stiffens in her sleep, and I whisper an “I know,” she make a gentle little shushing sound, looking up to tell whoever it is that we were here first, and Prim needs her rest. 

  
  


Only, it’s Katniss, who has frozen in place just by the door, eyes on me. She looks beautiful -- today’s dress is simple, by Capitol standards. A red thing that laces up the side and floats around her feet. Even when she’s still it seems to be in motion. 

  
She speaks first. 

 

“Oh.”   
  
It sort of falls out of her mouth, like she didn’t mean for it to, but she isn’t upset it did either. 

 

_ Oh _ . 

 

What did I expect? She made it perfectly clear that she hadn’t been expecting to come home to anyone in her interviews with Caesar. That she didn’t want to. My grip on the baby stiffens, and then she says --   
  
“I didn’t know anyone was out here,” she says. I think that’s all I get, but she follows it up with, “You weren’t there. When I got in. I thought--”   
  
She doesn’t finish telling me, but she does take a step towards us. And I don’t want to be angry at her, really, I don’t. But I still manage to cut out,   
  
“Sorry to disappoint. They won’t let us leave yet.” 

 

A beat. “Do you want to leave?” she asks. I can’t place why she sounds so bewildered. Like maybe I haven’t seen any of her interviews. Or, probably more accurately, like she thinks I’m stupid. 

  
I stand, moving Primrose to my hip and regretting it when she whines as she wakes. “We’re going to miss doors, and I don’t really feel like--”   
  
“Doors?” she asks. “No. I told them . . .” her hand comes up to her head, where I can tell she’s about to tug at her hair but decides against it, as if only just remembering that they’ve piled the braids up in some elaborate architecture. “No. You aren’t going back.”   
  
Like we’ve discussed this. 

 

No. Not quite. Like she’s been thinking about it. 

 

“But I thought,” I try, and it comes out pathetic. “I just mean -- I know you didn’t want us in--” 

“Like hell I don’t want you,” she interrupts. 

 

She means me and Primrose. In her fancy new house at the Victor’s Village, but there’s something about it. Her saying it like that. Looking at me like that. She means both of us, and mostly my daughter. But there’s something about it. Her saying it like that. Looking at me like that.    
  


“No one ever fucking asks me what I want, is the problem,” she snaps. “Have you even eaten yet?” 

 

My cheeks go hot. “I got her a snack earlier, but they didn’t want us in the kitchen--” 

  
“That isn’t what I asked.” 

 

She’s frustrated, still. With me or the situation, I’m not certain. 

 

“What do you want, Katniss?” I ask after a long moment. 

  
She scowls. “I want you to come inside and eat the stupid meal they made for me.”   
  
And then she stomps back into the house, skirt flaring out behind her. 


	2. indeed there will be time

The baby and I are nowhere near important enough to be seated right near Katniss. It’s clear by the time we come back inside that the meal has started without us. Katniss is scowling down at her plate, maybe still angry at me from earlier. I want to cry. Prim reaches up and rests a hand on my face. “Mama,” she says, as if she doesn’t already have my attention.   
  
“Baby,” I say back, as I always do, adjusting her in my arms a little, as if pretending to drop her. She giggles, so I do it again. “Is that fun?” I ask, pretending to drop her a third time. Her laugh this time is just a bit too loud for the present company, and while I adore the shrieking laughter, I can feel eyes on us.   
  
Katniss’s, more than anyone’s.   
  
“Sorry,” I mumble, reaching up and pushing some of my hair behind my eat. I find my seat, across the table and five people down from Katniss. “You hungry, baby?” I ask, careful to keep my voice low. Really, they should be glad that the baby is in a good mood. Who the hell eats dinner this late, anyway? “Let’s see what we’ve got.”   
  
I eat the salad first, bouncing Primrose on my knee and offering her a few bites of veggies that she scrunches her face up at. I don’t know how to even undo the top of this dress, but I’ll need to soon in order to really feed her. The bitter greens aren’t exactly baby friendly. She twists around in my lap and then slams a tiny fist on the tablecloth, making the water in my glass jump.   
  
“Sweetheart,” I plead.   
  
But it’s no use. She sees now what she couldn’t before, when she was asleep on the porch. “Kat- _nah_!” she cries, moving as if to crawl across the table, candles and all, to get to her. “Kat- _nah_! My Kat- _nah_!”   
  
All eyes are on us, now. “Prim,” I murmur, trying to pull her back towards me, and she whines.   
  
“Mama. Kat- _nah_.”   
  
“I know,” I say, keeping my voice low. “Katniss is busy right now. We gotta wait.”   
  
She jerks again, trying to get out of my arms, and I give up on the salad entirely, pushing my chair back and standing up without letting go of her. The rest of the table is on the second course, anyway.   
  
Primrose lets out an anguished cry, realizing that I’m intending on taking her away from Katniss. Again. Her little arms reach out, as if she can get to Katniss from all the way over here.   
  
“Will you _please_ get your child under control?” asks a voice I don’t quite recognize, and I duck my face against the baby’s hair and hustle out of the dining room. We’ve missed doors, by now, and Katniss seemed insistent that the two of us weren’t going back to the Community Home, once all this is over. For what felt like the two seconds I got to see her.   
  
I duck into the hallway, hearing the conversation pick back up in the other room. About us, probably. Primrose thrashes in my arms and I say, “I know,” and “My baby,” and “I’m sorry.” Technically, I know where Madge’s bedroom is. I could possibly lay Prim down to sleep there, but I don’t want her in that bed, and I especially don’t want her out of my sight. The porch is shot, as an option, because Katniss might come back out and that would only upset the baby more. I try bouncing her again to soothe her, but she lets out a miserable little wail. 

 

“Angel,” I beg. “You hungry?” I ask again. If I have to take the entire dress off in order to feed her, I will. I manage to slip into the bathroom, making sure I lock the door before I try first to just push down the top. It’s too tight -- and too tight to slip a breast out, either. The dress was designed to put my chest on display as much as possible and, apparently, to make it impossible to feed my kid. 

 

I set Primrose down on the tile floor and she looks up at me as I untie the ribbon around the front of the stupid dress, her eyes wide and her little bottom lip still trembling. I manage to work free just the top few buttons on the back of the thing and shove the sleeves down, and then I sit on the edge of the bathtub and pick her back up.   
  
“Yeah, it’s okay,” I try to soothe. “Mama’s got you.”   
  
Her little fingers latch around the hideous pearl necklace again, and I rest my head against the cool tile while she eats. I’m so hungry. Katniss was right to question whether I had eaten or not today, but I hadn’t even thought about it, yet. She never had to remind me while I was pregnant. I was so hungry then, so often. Katniss would sneak food away during dinner and give it to me later that night, when we were in bed and she heard my stomach rumble. She got the same portions as everyone else, but she would insist. 

 

There’s a knock at the door. The baby tenses, and I brush my hand over her back. “In here,” I call.   
  
“I know.” It’s Katniss. “Can I come in?” 

 

I don’t answer. I don’t want Primrose to work herself into a tizzy again. Like her mother, wanting what isn’t hers. Not anymore, at least. I’m so tired and so hungry. Tears leak out of the corners of my eyes, probably ruining my makeup.   
  
Another soft knock. I force my eyes to open, to look down at my daughter.   
  
“You’re so hungry,” I murmur, quiet enough that we won’t be heard through the door. “I know, baby.” 

 

There’s some noise on the other side of the door, and then I hear Katniss’s voice, clear and decisive. “No,” she says. “I’m staying here. Thank you.” I grab the puffy white towel from the back of the door and use it to cover myself, though Prim reaches up to fuss with it immediately, and open the door. I don’t realize until Katniss nearly falls into the bathroom that what I thought was one last knock earlier must have been her head hitting the door as she sat down in front of it. She scrambles back into the bathroom with us, locking the door behind us.   
  
“I could have gotten them to give you a bedroom to breastfeed in,” Katniss says as I return to my seat on the side of the tub.   
  
I roll my eyes. “Right,” I say. “Mayor Undersee would love to have a Community Home dyke breastfeed in his bed.”   
  
“He would if I told him to,” Katniss says, raising her chin. “Is she--? Can I see her?” her voice softens at the request. “I know she’s busy, but . . .”   
  
I suck in a breath, considering. It’s nothing Katniss hasn’t seen before, but for some reason I loathe the idea of lifting the towel right now. “You can see her when she’s finished eating,” I say. “She’ll just get herself worked up again.” Really, I’m lucky that she doesn’t seem to recognize her voice from under the towel.   
  
Katniss nods. Up close, I can see that they’ve caked her in makeup. She looks two shades lighter than she really is. Her lips are painted the color of a plum. “I told that guy to shut up,” she says.   
  
“He’s right, anyway,” I say. “We shouldn’t be here.”   
  
Katniss frowns.   
  
“Why do we even have to--” I start, and the baby detaches from my breast, her hands pushing up at the towel again. I try to offer the other one, but she doesn’t want it. “Why are we pretending like--”   
  
“Mama!” Primrose whines from under the towel.   
  
Katniss’s fingers twitch towards the towel and she cover by smoothing them along the fabric of her skirt. “Pretend like what?” she asks, her voice tight.   
  
“Nothing,” I say, pulling the towel off of the baby and putting on a face like I’m surprised she was down there. “HI, baby,” I say, trying to keep at least some of myself covered. “You feeling better now?” I ask.   
  
“Bah!”   
  
“Bah!” I repeat softly, tapping her little button nose. “You were just hungry, weren’t you? Mama’s sorry.”   
  
“She got so big,” chokes Katniss. I think Primrose realizes, now, that we aren’t alone anymore. She turns around in my lap again, and this time, I can’t stop her when she launches herself at Katniss, because Katniss eases her off my lap immediately.   
  
I want to be angry. I want to be so angry with Katniss, for making us come to this stupid thing, for making us miss doors, for telling the entire world she had no one to come home to. But I can’t tear my eyes away. Katniss buries her face against the top of Primrose’s head, the way I always do, and closes her eyes before she breathes in.   
  
“Kat _-nah_ ,” murmurs Primrose, happily.   
  
“Hi, Prim,” says Katniss, her voice broken. “Hi, baby. When did you start saying Katniss?”   
  
“Kat- _nah_ ,” she repeats again, squealing joyfully when Katniss rains kisses all over her little face. Prim rests a hand on Katniss’s cheek and Katniss kisses that, too, which earns her another delighted squeak. “Mama, Mama,” babbles Primrose, and I hold out my arms, thinking she wants to come back to me, but she just gestures wildly at Katniss. “It Kat- _nah_.”   
  
“It is,” I say. “You’re so smart.”   
  
“You _are_ so smart,” says Katniss. “Peeta,” she prompts.   
  
“What?” I ask, remembering myself, finally, and pushing my arms back through the sleeves of my dress so I can hang the towel back up.   
  
“When did she start saying my name?” Katniss repeats.   
  
“Today,” I say.   
  
Some look I can’t name crosses Katniss’s features. Remorse, maybe.   
  
“Shouldn’t matter,” I say, rising to my feet and putting a hand on either side of Primrose’s little body, ready to peel her away from Katniss. “Not like you had anyone waiting for you at home.”   
  
Now I know exactly the look on Katniss’s face. Hurt.   
  
“C’mere, baby,” I say to my daughter, but Katniss tugs her a little closer to her chest.   
  
“That’s not what I meant,” she says.   
  
I roll my eyes. “Can you give her to me?” I ask.   
  
“Are you kidding?” Katniss asks, shrinking against the door a little. “Peeta. I just got her.”   
  
Though I don’t want to, I can’t help but to soften at the name. Nobody else calls me that, these days. Not other than Katniss.   
  
The baby lifts her hand to Katniss’s face again, and Katniss seems to forget her irritation with me, catching her tiny wrist between two fingers and pressing open mouthed kisses on first her palm and then each finger.   
  
“Can you say _Katniss_?” she asks, very softly, and my daughter is more than happy to comply. I feel like a monster for trying to take her away. My poor child already has few enough people who love her in the world. And then, Katniss tries, “What about _Peeta_? Can you say _Peeta?_ ”   
  
“She can say _Mama_ ,” I interrupt. “She doesn’t need to say Peeta.”   
  
Katniss laughs softly. “Okay,” she says, more to Primrose than to me. “You can say Mama.”   
  
“What did you mean, then?” I ask. “Other than that you didn’t have anyone to go home to.”   
  
Katniss stares at me for a long moment. “Can we not do this here?” she asks. “Everyone is waiting for us out there.”   
  
“I’m not going back out,” I say, petulant.   
  
“You can’t stay in here all night,” Katniss says. “And I can’t, either. Effie Trinket will already want my head for disappearing this long.”   
  
“Then maybe you shouldn’t have,” I say, and I reach for Prim again but Katniss doesn’t even acknowledge my hands, just goes back to bouncing the baby.   
  
“We’re going back out to the dining room,” Katniss informs me, her voice even and her eyes almost dead. “I’m going to make whoever the fuck is sitting next to me trade seats with you, Prim is going to sit on my lap, and you’re going to eat dinner.”   
  
“But I--”   
  
“I wasn’t asking,” Katniss says, reaching behind her and opening the bathroom door again.   
  
“Wait!” I cry.   
  
She pauses, at least.   
  
“Can you help me with my dress?” I ask, pathetic.   
  
She nods, finally passing Prim back to me. I stand facing the bathtub and hold my breath as she carefully does up the buttons I had struggled with so much on my own. There’s a moment, when she finishes, when her hand brushes against my upper back before she moves my hair back over the back of the dress. I could sob. I understand my daughter’s begging, earlier. _Katniss. Katniss_.   
  
But then it’s over. She eases my daughter back out of my arms and I use my trembling hands to try to retie the bow at the front of my dress.   
  
We return to the dining room exactly the way she says. The man sitting next to her isn’t thrilled about giving up what he must consider to be one of the very best seats at the table, but he clearly don’t rank highly enough to argue with her.   
  
The server comes by with a plate for me, filled almost to overflow. Roasted broccoli, mashed potatoes, steak. I whisper a _thank you_ and glance over at Katniss, who is already offering some of the vegetables from her plate to Katniss. 

 

 _That’s not what I meant_. What did she mean, then? I shovel some of the potatoes into my mouth, and I mean to finish eating as quickly as I can and maybe sneak away with my daughter again, but then I could cry for how good they taste.   
  
“You want more?” asks Katniss, laughing softly.   
  
Primrose reaches for the plate, snatching another head of broccoli in her little fist. Katniss laughs warmly, indulgent.   
  
“By all means,” she says as Primrose shoves the vegetable into her mouth. “Help yourself.”   
  
I can’t help my laugh. Katniss glances over at me, and I forget it all for a moment, the anger, the hurt.   
  
“Reminds me of someone,” she says, very softly. She means me, eating her dandelion heads in our cot at night all spring, when I was so very pregnant.   
  
“And she just ate,” I say. “She must be so hungry.”   
  
“Kat _-nah_ ,” says the baby, clearly not happy at us getting distracted. She waves another broccoli floret in her little fist. “Mama.” She reaches again, and Katniss realizes right before I do that she’s about to take a fistful of the mashed potatoes, so she stops her and scoops a little mound onto her spoon.   
  
“Peeta, I swear, if you don’t actually eat,” Katniss threatens softly, so quietly no one else will hear it. I go back to shoveling the food into my mouth, though I really didn’t mean to be so obedient. 

 

“Katniss,” Effie Trinket begins. “Do you think you might be a little bit more sociable? I’m sure somebody else could hold the baby while--”   
  
Katniss pulls Primrose closer to her body. “No,” she says. “I’m sorry, Effie, but it’s my homecoming dinner. I want to be with my --” she falters. She doesn’t know what to call Primrose. She never does.   
  
“With people you actually know,” I cover. “It’s just so nice of you all to have us here,” I continue. “And for Katniss to watch the baby so I can actually eat.”   
  
Effie tuts, at this, but seems to decide to leave us alone. I clear my plate quickly and dessert is served as soon as Katniss’s is empty, too. A chocolate cake so rich that it turns my stomach in a single bite. In fact, even without the cake, I’m feeling a little green. I mean to say something to Katniss for the sake of Primrose’s stomach, but I look over just in time to see her smudge the tiniest bit of frosting on the baby’s face.   
  
Yeah, Primrose was right. I could cry, too, from how badly I want to have her. I want it to be simple. Like this. Her and me and the baby, like we always used to pretend it could be, someday.   
  
Katniss laughs softly, kissing at her cheeks. “She looks tired,” Katniss notes, and the fact that she can tell all these weeks later makes me ache.   
  
“She must be,” I say. “I am, too.”   
  
Going home is much easier said than done. Katniss tells her escort that she’d like to head for the Victor’s Village and she’s passed around the room to give handshakes or be enveloped in hugs that she seems entirely uncomfortable with. Primrose whines, pushing her face against my throat.   
  
“I know,” I soothe.   
  
“Kat- _nah_ ,” she whines. 

 

“Yeah, yeah,” I say. “I know. No love for your mama anymore.”    
  
“That’s not true,” says Katniss, appearing at my side again and taking the baby yet another time. “I’m just new and shiny. Prim, where’s your mama?”    
  
“Mama!” the baby says, pointing at me, tired but clearly proud of herself.   
  
“There you go,” Katniss says warmly. “You ready?”   
  
“So we’re coming home with you, then?” I ask. 

 

Katniss shoots me an incredulous look. “Where else would you go?” she asks.   
  
She’s right. And it’s so late. Rather than walk all the way to the Victor’s Village, they load us into a car and Katniss tightens her arms around the baby during the brief, bumpy ride.   
  
Once we’re all safe inside, Katniss and I get the baby changed back into the soft cotton dress she was wearing this morning, because I don’t have any sleeping clothes to her anymore, if everything stays at the Community Home. While I do, Katniss sorts through the clothing they’ve already filled the dresser in the master bedroom with. I can see by the look on her face that she’s not thrilled with her choices. 

  
“We’ll order a crib for her right away,” Katniss adds, and I feel a little dizzy at the thought. A crib for my child. Our child, however unhappy I’ve been with Katniss today. “Okay, here.” She stands, bringing a stack of folded clothing over towards me. “Can you help with my dress?”   
  
I kick my heels off, first, and then cross the small space between us. My fingers are trembling as I pick at the ribbon. “How tight is this?” I ask.   
  
She laughs breathlessly. “You’re telling me.”   
  
I manage to loosen it, and she lets it fall to the ground entirely. I’m careful not to look. She’s gotten changed in front of me before -- a necessity at the Community Home -- but we always give each other whatever privacy we can.   
  
“There’s a slip under it,” she laughs. Like it’s funny that I wasn’t just outright staring at her. “Sorry. I guess I’m just used to everyone in the Capitol staring while I get dressed.”   
  
I take the stack of clothing from her hands, not sure how to respond. I want to say something like: _yes, because I’m known for being like a Capitolite._ Instead, I just say, “I hated that part.”   
  
“Yeah,” she murmurs, and it’s like she’s just now really looking at me. Her eyes catch on my face, and she wets her lips. For a second, I think she’s going to say something about how I look. Unlike myself, sure, but probably objectively beautiful. Instead, she says, “They really did a number on you, didn’t they?”   
  
I’m not prepared for it to feel like such a rejection. “It’s not like I asked them to,” I snap, shaking out the pile she gave me until I locate a tee shirt and a pair of sleeping shorts. I turn on my heel, lifting Primrose up and tucking her under my arm though I don’t know where we’re going. I just don’t want to be here, right now, in Katniss’s bedroom.   
  
“Peeta,” she protests. 

 

“Mama!” Primrose whines, reaching over my shoulder for Katniss. “Kat-nah!”   
  
“Peeta,” Katniss repeats, grabbing my arm. “Where are you going?”   
  
I want to pull away from the touch, but I don’t manage it. “I don’t know,” I say. “But it doesn’t seem like you want us here, so--”   
  
She pulls on my arm, just a little. “I didn’t say that,” she says.   
  
“Did you have to?” I ask. “You didn’t have anybody you wanted to come home to, and here we are--” I cut myself off. “I just -- Sorry. I know you wanted a house for yourself,” I say. I don’t know why I’m apologizing to her for my broken heart. “We can be out of your hair in the morning.” Primrose will probably never get over it. I’ll be hearing her cry for Kat- _nah_ for the rest of my life.   
  
“Don’t be stupid,” Katniss says. “I just said that because I thought --” she swallows. “If I didn’t come back, it would be one thing. But if I didn’t come back and they all knew to come looking for you . . .” she trails off. “I didn’t want to ruin your life.”   
  
“My life would have been ruined either way if you died in there,” I say.   
  
Her mouth opens, as if to respond, but she doesn’t seem to have a good response. I set Primrose back down on the bed and kiss her forehead. And then Katniss is beside me, stroking at Primrose’s hair and singing, very softly, a song I haven’t heard the entire time she’s been gone. I slip away, once I’m sure the baby is asleep, because somehow it’s too painful to watch them together right now.   
  
“You weren’t supposed to believe me,” Katniss says while I get a glass of water. “I thought -- I thought you would know I was lying.”   
  
I scoff. “Right. I should have just assumed you actually meant that you’d like to give up your new house and share it with some toddler and her mother.”   
  
“Some toddler?” Katniss repeats, sounding a little disgusted that I would even say as much. “She’s mine, too, Peeta. You’re the one who said it. You said I was her mom.”   
  
I flinch. “You didn’t agree,” I say. “I thought--”   
  
Katniss crosses the distance between us and eases the water pitcher out of my hand. “She’s mine,” Katniss agrees. “Both of ours.”   
  
She is. Has been since before she was born. But I’m so relieved to hear Katniss say it that I could cry. 

 

“Both of ours,” I agree, instead. “I was afraid--” I cut myself off. “I didn’t want to have to do it alone. Raise her.”   
  
“You don’t,” Katniss says, reaching up and tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “You wanna get out of all this?”   
  
So badly. 

 

In the interest of not waking the baby, we end up in the bathroom attached to what seems like one of what seems like countless other bedrooms in the house. While she fusses with the temperature of the shower, I wet a washcloth and start trying to scrub off the powder they put on my face.   
  
“I was thinking about how we could give Prim a bath, earlier,” Katniss admits. “The tub in our room is huge. She’d love it.”   
  
Our room.   
  
“She would,” I agree. Our room. Our room. Our room. “So we -- um. You still want us all to sleep together, then?” 

 

Katniss looks at me, eyebrows pulling together like she might have said the wrong thing. “Unless--” she starts.   
  
“No,” I say. “No unless.”   
  
A sigh escapes her. Relief, I think. “I hate sleeping alone,” she admits. “I got so used to having you with me--”   
  
I put down my rag, closing the distance between us and wrapping her up in my arms. She’s lost weight. That’s to be expected, after the games, but I still find it jarring. She melts against the touch, and I realize that with the exception of us passing the baby back and forth earlier, I haven’t touched her at all since she’s been home.   
  
I’m not sure how long I hold her, but it doesn’t feel like long enough. 

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> guess which big dumb lesbian is writing yet another spin on The Victor's Wife?  
> You guessed right.  
> This is mostly just a sandbox, please don't expect regular updates, I've just been plugging at this universe for a couple years when other projects I prioritize don't come! A very sweet anon asked me for more femme!Peeta everlark and this was the thing I had that was the closest to complete that I could offer :) 
> 
> This predates If You See Light in my drafts but a lot from this fic was lifted to serve IYSL lol  
> -O


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